


Unspoken

by storiesfortravellers



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Friendship/Love, Fuck Or Die, Gen, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-14
Updated: 2012-08-14
Packaged: 2017-11-12 03:15:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesfortravellers/pseuds/storiesfortravellers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For this prompt at avengerkink: "<i>I’d like to see a fuck or die situation where the characters involved decide that death is the better option. No actual character death, please, and if there’s torture involved, please keep it to a minimum. What I want to see is the aftermath of such a decision....</i>"</p><p>Warnings for attempted noncon/dubcon because of the premise. Brief mentions of torture, very non-explicit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unspoken

The kidnappers made their threat. 

Give them a show, or Natasha and Clint would die. Slowly.

They were tied up but they could move enough to turn their heads and look at each other.

They didn’t need to talk. They saw it in each other’s eyes, clear and gray and sure.

They both knew what it was like to go numb with another man’s control. They both knew what it was to have their body turn into something that didn’t belong to them.

They could do torture. They could do death. 

They couldn’t do betrayal. Not of each other, and definitely not of themselves. 

Not again.

The answer was no.

The torture started right away.

\--

They were rescued before it got too far.

But far enough that they’d be in medical for at least a month.

They smiled as their team visited, as Coulson and Fury and Hill visited too. They were fine. Natasha was bored with the protective concern, and Clint was bored with being stuck in a bed with no way to train. 

They didn’t tell anyone that the torture was a choice. 

They almost hadn’t been able to hold out. Clint had never been so tempted to give in as when he saw them working on Natasha, breaking her ribs with their fists. And when they were whaling on Clint, he could see that she felt the same.

But they were strong. They stood together and they survived.

They always did.

\--

Late at night, they were still awake. They shunned the painkillers, which made them drowsy (defenseless) and threw away anything that was supposed to help them sleep. Which made them all the more alert as they listened to the dull hum of the fluorescent lights and the noise of their various medical monitors.

They didn’t talk much. Which wasn't unusual for them, actually. 

But, when it was late, almost morning, Natasha looked over and said, clearly, “Hey.”

“Hey,” Clint answered.

She paused, her eyes focused but soft somehow, so unlike her. “Thanks,” she said.

Clint knew that it wasn’t just a thanks for needing to say no as much as she did. It wasn’t just a thanks for withstanding torture so they could hang on – desperately, needfully – to that “no.” 

_Thank you for watching me get tortured. Thank you for not stopping it._

Clint understood. Maybe he was the only one fucked up enough to understand, maybe that’s the only reason they got along at all. But he understood.

“Me too,” he said.

“I’m glad we’re friends,” she said. _I’m glad we’re still friends. We almost weren’t_.

“Yeah,” he said. “I got your back, Tasha.”

“I got yours, too.”

“I know you do,” he said, softly, roughly. “Even today, during. I knew.”

The buzz of the machines seemed loud then. They were silent the rest of the night.

(end)


End file.
